Shepherd Of Hermas

SHEPHERD OF HERMAS The Shepherd was a popular book among Christians of the first four centuries. Written by Hermas, brother of Pius, bishop of Rome, during the first half of the second century, the book was regarded by some churches as canonical Scripture. It was eventually excluded from the canon, however, in part because it was known not to have been written by an Apostle. Even so, it was included as one of the books of the New Testament in the fourth-century codex Sinaiticus and is mentioned by other authors of the time as standing on the margins of the canon. David Says… One of the most “desirable” traits of a book was to be ascribed to an apostle as author. This helps explains why so much of the pseudagraphia is under the names such as “The Acts of Peter” or “The Acts of Paul and Seneca”. Ironically, one of the telling features of these books was that fact they were written in a language source that most of the apostles would not have known or practiced. The book takes its name from an angelic mediator who appears to Hermas in the form of a shepherd. Other angelic beings appear here as well, in particular as old woman who indentifies herself as the personification of the Christian Church. These various figures communicate divine revelations to Hermas and, upon request, interpret their meaning to him. The book is divided into a series of five visions, twelve sets of commandments (or mandates), and ten parables (or similitude’s). The visions and similitude’s are enigmatic and symbolic; they are usually explained to Hermas as having spiritual significance for the Christian here on earth. The mandates are somewhat easier to interpret, consisting for the

most part of direct exhortations to speak the truth, give alms, do well, and avoid sexual immorality, drunkenness, gluttony and other vices. Indeed, the entire book is driven by an ethical concern: what can Christians do if they have fallen into sin after being baptized? A number of early Christians had insisted that those who returned to lives of sin after joining the church had lost any hope of salvation. An alternative view is advanced by Hermas, who maintains, on the basis of divine revelations, that Christians who have fallen again into sin after their baptism have a second chance (but only one second chance) to repent and return to God’s good graces. Those who refuse to avail themselves to this opportunity, however, or who revert to sin thereafter, will be forced to face the judgment of God on the day of reckoning soon to come. The Shepherd of Hermas is the longest work to survive from the first hundred years of the Christian church. EXTRACTS FROM THE BOOK

Chapter 8, Section 1. “Who is this then?” I asked, “The Church”, he said. I said to him, “Why is she elderly?” “Because”, he said, “she was created first, before anything else. That is why she is elderly, and for her sake the world was created>” A passing uneducated glance would not turn over any interest in this verse. But to Judaism, this is a direct rip-off of the well

known and taught concept about the Torah. The Rabbis and Sages taught that all the letters of the Hebrew alphabet gathered before God to determine who would be the first letter spoken during creation. God counters by telling them that He is going to create the “Torah”, which is the whole world is being created for. As Christianity began to grow, there was a concentrated effort to distance their teachings from Judaism while at the same time utilizing the rich and long history of the Jews. This was important because in Roman circles, if it’s new, it can’t be true. So the “borrowings” continued for about 300 years. Worth noting: some of the “borrowings” were incidental, while others were intended to d damage to the Jews and their reputation. Eventually, this type of religious borrowing became the cannon fodder for the “Replacement Theology”. Chapter 26, Section 1. “First of all, believe that God is One, who created and completed all things, and made everything that exists out of that which did not, who contains all things but is Himself, alone, uncontained.” The first line of the verse is very similar to the ancient Jewish Scripture and Prayer known as “The Shema”. It then goes on the describe the creation event in a rather “Pauline” type writing. One of the possible reasons that this book (along with many others from early Christian sources) is that this book makes no claims of understanding a doctrine of the Trinity. Many of the earliest writings did not contain a substantial amount of

teaching on this subject. The writer here borrows from the Shema to stress that fact that belief and allegiance to God alone will brings about salvation in that last day of judgment. Chapter 66, Section 7. “But look, Lord”, I said, “They have in fact repented from heir whole heart.” “ I myself know they have repented from their whole heart”, he replied. “But do you think”, he said, “ that the sins of those ho repent are forgiven on the spot? Not at all!” The verses go on to address that the person that repents must “torment his own soul” and describes a process very similar to the Jewish practice of Teshuva. Contrary to popular Christian teaching, the blood of Jesus does not quickly erase sin. It takes repentance and involvement on behalf of the offender to clear the scales. Chapter 16, Section 3, verse 9. I began to ask her about the times, about whether the end had already come, and she cried out with a great voice, “You fool! Don’t you see that the tower is still under construction? Only when its construction is finished will the end arrive.” Quite a few chapters are devoted to the story of the tower. Great detail is given to describe the kinds of stones that will contribute to its completion and the kinds of stones that cannot be used. Generally speaking, when a stone cannot be used, it is because there is a flaw of sin or corruption in its material. Other stones don’t make the cut (so to speak)

because of their shape; the builders just can’t find a place for them. Finally, one set of stones, even though they have repented, cannot become part of the building because of a previous transgression that cannot be erased: the death of Messiah. Most commentators believe these stones to be referring to the Jewish people. Early Christian teachers were struggling with the idea that it seemed like the end was not near and they had put a GrecoRomanized spin on the words of Jesus. So the emphasis changed from the apocalyptic message of Jesus to the future coming Kingdom and reign of the Church. Chapter 29, Section 1, verse 1. “But if you always keep thinking about your own wife, you will never sin.” Another challenge of the early Christian movement was to determine how to navigate through the newfound hope for women. Many teachers were telling the women in their congregations to deny their husbands sexual intimacy, much to the despair of the men. They felt like anything that pleased the body was sinful, so sexual intimacy should be reserved only for the cause of procreation, and even at that, no enjoyment was to be experienced. Other Christians believed that the best way to prepare for their future in heaven was to purge their bodies from evil, and the best way to do this was to wildly embrace the passions of the flesh until the fire of lust inside quit burning. You can imagine which group had the larger following. Hermas seems to embrace the idea that faithfulness to your

wife and constantly seeking her good is the best way to keep from bringing evil desire into your life and marriage. The problem we have indentifying with all this kind of talk is our disassociation with the culture of the time. As Christianity moved away from its spiritual adoptive parents, it lost its boundary markers for moral and God pleasing behavior. The rulebooks were being written on the fly, addressing the clashing cultural/Christian values as best they could. Books like the Shepherd of Hermas were written to try and bridge those gaps. Many of today’s Christian scholars look upon these writings with a great contempt. I support these writings and suggest we delve deeper into the culture and situations that brought about their design. It is easy to look backwards through 2000 years of Christian scholarship (most of which has completely lost its direction from the words of Jesus) and teach others how obvious the errors of these early writers were to see. These letters were for the most part (exceptions are also known) trying to bring together a community of faith that had allowed itself to veer off into each culture, taking on cultural distinctive along the way, which was painting a very different presentation of the faith in each of the geographical areas.